Xianlin Ji's Books

The Cowshed

Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

By: Ji Xianlin

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The Cowshed

Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

By: Ji Xianlin

The Chinese Cultural Revolution began in 1966 and led to a ten-year-long reign of Maoist terror throughout China, in which millions died or were sent to labor camps in the country or subjected to other forms of extreme discipline and humiliation. Ji Xianlin was one of them. The Cowshed is Ji’s harrowing account of his imprisonment in 1968 on the campus of Peking University and his subsequent disillusionment with the cult of Mao. As the campus spirals into a political frenzy, Ji, a professor of Eastern languages, is persecuted by lecturers and students from his own department. His home is raided, his most treasured possessions are destroyed, and Ji himself must endure hours of humiliation at brutal “struggle sessions.” He is forced to construct a cowshed (a makeshift prison for intellectuals who were labeled class enemies) in which he is then housed with other former colleagues. His eyewitness account of this excruciating experience is full of sharp irony, empathy, and remarkable insights into a central event in Chinese history. In contemporary China, the Cultural Revolution remains a delicate topic, little discussed, but if a Chinese citizen has read one book on the subject, it is likely to be Ji’s memoir. When The Cowshed was published in China in 1998, it quickly became a bestseller. The Cultural Revolution had nearly disappeared from the collective memory. Prominent intellectuals rarely spoke openly about the revolution, and books on the subject were almost nonexistent. By the time of Ji’s death in 2009, little had changed, and despite its popularity, The Cowshed remains one of the only testimonies of its kind. As Zha Jianying writes in the introduction, “The book has sold well and stayed in print. But authorities also quietly took steps to restrict public discussion of the memoir, as its subject continues to be treated as sensitive. The present English edition, skillfully translated by Chenxin Jiang, is hence a welcome, valuable addition to the small body of work in this genre. It makes an important contribution to our understanding of that period.”

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Page Count

217

Publisher

New York Review of Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1681376571

ISBN 13

9781681376578

The Cowshed

Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

By: Xianlin Ji

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Cowshed

Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

By: Xianlin Ji

In contemporary China, the Cultural Revolution remains a delicate topic, little discussed, but if a Chinese citizen has read one book on the subject, it is likely to be Ji's memoir. When The Cowshed was published in China in 1998, it quickly became a bestseller. The Cultural Revolution had nearly disappeared from the collective memory. Prominent intellectuals rarely spoke openly about the revolution, and books on the subject were almost nonexistent. By the time of Ji's death in 2009, little had changed, and despite its popularity, The Cowshed remains one of the only testimonies of its kind.

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Page Count

217

Publisher

New York Review of Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1590179269

ISBN 13

9781590179260

The Cowshed

Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

By: Xianlin Ji

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The Cowshed

Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

By: Xianlin Ji

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N/A

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Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

217

Publisher

New York Review of Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1590179269

ISBN 13

9781590179260

The Cowshed

Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

By: Ji Xianlin

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

The Cowshed

Memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution

By: Ji Xianlin

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Solve jigsaw puzzle

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Page Count

217

Publisher

New York Review of Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1681376571

ISBN 13

9781681376578

Women Writers in Postsocialist China

By: Kay Schaffer,Xianlin Song

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Women Writers in Postsocialist China

By: Kay Schaffer,Xianlin Song

What does it mean to read from elsewhere? Women Writers in Postsocialist China introduces readers to a range and variety of contemporary Chinese women’s writing, which has seen phenomenal growth in recent years. The book addresses the different ways women’s issues are understood in China and the West, attending to the processes of translation, adaptation, and the grafting of new ideas with existing Chinese understandings of gender, feminism, subjectivity, consumerism and (post) modernism. By focusing on women’s autobiographical, biographical, fictional and historical writing, the book engages in a transcultural flow of ideas between western and indigenous Chinese feminisms. Taking account of the accretions of social, cultural, geographic, literary, economic, and political movements and trends, cultural formations and ways of thinking, it asks how the texts and the concepts they negotiate might be understood in the social and cultural spaces within China and how they might be interpreted differently elsewhere in the global locations in which they circulate. The book argues that women-centred writing in China has a direct bearing on global feminist theory and practice. This critical study of selected genres and writers highlights the shifts in feminist perspectives within contemporary local and global cultural landscapes.

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Page Count

208

Publisher

Routledge

Published Date

ISBN 10

1135091358

ISBN 13

9781135091354

Book's by Xianlin Ji

The Cowshed

The Cowshed

The Cowshed

The Cowshed

The Cowshed

The Cowshed

The Cowshed

The Cowshed

Women Writers in Postsocialist China

Women Writers in Postsocialist China

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